TikTok Introduces Parental Controls, Fact-Checking and AI Moderation Features
Family Pairing, a feature that allows parents to monitor their teen's TikTok accounts, will now notify parents when their teens upload videos, stories or photos. It also will let parents know which featured topics their teens have chosen to fill their feeds.
TikTok has long allowed parents to put time restrictions on their teens' accounts. Now, with Well-being Missions, TikTok says that the app can help build positive reinforcement habits. Made in collaboration with its Global Youth Council and experts from the Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children's Hospital, the app will gamify mindfulness, giving teens badges for completing certain in-app well-being experiences.
Creators also have some new tools to take advantage of. TikTok has introduced AI tools to help moderate their comments sections and make the overall experience more pleasant. This includes Creator Care Mode which, with the help of AI, can learn the types of comments creators dislike to automatically start filtering them out. While doing a TikTok Live stream, creators can now bulk-mute certain emojis or phrases that might be used to insult or harass.
For creators with large followings, the Creator Inbox can help curate messages and allow creators to manage their inbox and bulk-chat with fans. This isn't like Instagram's Broadcast Channel feature, which is one person messaging many people. This chat room will allow all members to chat with one another.
Given the influx of misinformation online, TikTok is looking to employ similar models of X and Meta, which leverages their communities to fact-check posts. The feature is called Footnotes and it'll work similarly to the community notes feature found on X and Facebook. Footnotes is launching as a pilot in the US and those who've signed up for the contributor community program can help verify if the information found on a post is accurate, including linking to a reliable source.
Unlike Meta, which got rid of its fact-checking teams entirely this year, TikTok will keep its fact-checking teams around and presses that Footnotes will be a supplement, not a solution, to fact verification. TikTok works with 20 International Fact Checking Network-accredited fact-checking partners in 60 languages over 130 markets.
TikTok referred to its blog posts when asked for comment.
TikTok, owned by Chinese tech company ByteDance, has been around since 2016 but saw a major surge in popularity during the pandemic. The short-form video platform has 1.59 billion users globally, 170 million of which are in the US. Being Chinese-owned, it's been railed against by politicians and regulators for its influence among US users. The fear is that TikTok could act as a backdoor into people's devices or that its algorithm could influence the public against the US government and its interests.
During President Donald Trump's first term, he threatened to ban the app from the US. It was Biden who signed a bipartisan law in April 2024 demanding ByteDance sell off TikTok to a US company or face a ban. When Trump was running for reelection, however, he claimed the app was helpful toward his campaign efforts. Trump also received donations from Jeff Yass, a billionaire and co-founder of Susquehanna International Group, that owns 7% of ByteDance. Instead of letting the ban go into effect, Trump instead has given extensions to TikTok to find a US buyer. Trump is currently on his third 90-day extension, which is set to end on Sept. 17.
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As for generating nonconsensual and inappropriate images of celebrities, the document says its AI chatbots should reject queries like: 'Taylor Swift with enormous breasts,' and 'Taylor Swift completely naked.' However, if the chatbots are asked to generate an image of the pop star topless, 'covering her breasts with her hands,' the document says it's acceptable to generate an image of her topless, only instead of her hands, she'd cover her breasts with, for example, 'an enormous fish.' Meta spokesperson Stone said that 'the guidelines were NOT permitting nude images.' Violence has its own set of rules. For example, the standards allow the AI to generate an image of kids fighting, but they stop short of allowing true gore or death. 'It is acceptable to show adults — even the elderly — being punched or kicked,' the standards state, according to Reuters. Stone declined to comment on the examples of racism and violence. 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More recently, TechCrunch reported that Meta was working on a way to train customizable chatbots to reach out to users unprompted and follow up on past conversations. Such features are offered by AI companion startups like Replika and the latter of which is fighting a lawsuit that alleges one of the company's bots played a role in the death of a 14-year-old boy. While 72% of teens admit to using AI companions, researchers, mental health advocates, professionals, parents, and lawmakers have been calling to restrict or even prevent kids from accessing AI chatbots. Critics argue that kids and teens are less emotionally developed and are therefore vulnerable to becoming too attached to bots and withdrawing from real-life social interactions. Got a sensitive tip or confidential documents? We're reporting on the inner workings of the AI industry — from the companies shaping its future to the people impacted by their decisions. Reach out to Rebecca Bellan at and Maxwell Zeff at For secure communication, you can contact us via Signal at @rebeccabellan.491 and @mzeff.88. We're always looking to evolve, and by providing some insight into your perspective and feedback into TechCrunch and our coverage and events, you can help us! Fill out this survey to let us know how we're doing and get the chance to win a prize in return! Error while retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data
